Proceedings of the 7th WSEAS International Conference on Power Systems, Beijing, China, September 15-17, 2007 164

A Novel Line Stability Index (NLSI) for Voltage Stability

Assessment of Power Systems
A. YAZDANPANAH-GOHARRIZI, R. ASGHARI
Electrical and Computer Department
Azad Islamic University, Karaj Branch
Tehran-Karaj
Iran
Emails:Yazdanpanah_tabu@yahoo.com, facts.tcsc@gmail.com

Abstract: - The management of power systems has become more difficult than earlier because power systems
are operated closer to security limits, environmental constraints restrict the expansion of transmission network,
the need for long distance power transfer has increased and fewer operators are engaged in the supervision and
operation of power systems. Voltage stability has become a major concern in many power systems and many
blackouts have been reported, where the reason has been voltage instability.
This paper presents a novel line stability index (NLSI) referred to a line initiated from the voltage quadratic
equation at the sending and resaving end of a representation of a 2-bus system. The line index in the inter-
connected system in which the value that is closed to one indicates that the line has reached its instability limit
which could cause sudden voltage drop to the corresponding bus caused by the active and reactive load
variation. The proposed index consider both active and reactive power to investigate the voltage stability
because this index provides more precise results than those which consider only reactive power. To indicate
the ability of proposed index, NEW ENGLAND 30 bus is utilized and simulation results show good
conformity with the other stability index that proposed in literature.

Key-Words: - Voltage stability index, Maximum permissible load, NLSI factor.

1 Introduction voltage instability phenomenon and quantify the

Although power production, transmission and
distribution are unbundled there still exist common
interests for these companies: power system
adequacy and security. The adequacy of production
and transmission capacity is maintained in the long-
term and is related to power system planning. The
security of power system is a mandatory public good
necessary for confidence in the power market. In
order to maintain a secure system, the system
operator needs to have at his disposal various
services called ancillary services from generation
and major customers.
The transmission networks need to be utilized
ever more efficiently. The transfer capacity of an
existing transmission network needs to be increased
without major investments but also without
compromising the security of the power system. The
more efficient use of transmission network has
already led to situation in which many power
systems are operated more often and longer close to
voltage stability limits. A power system stressed by
heavy loading has a substantially different response
to disturbances from that of a non-stressed system.
Methods to understand the voltage instability
phenomenon and quantify the stability indices have
been reported in works [1, 2, 3, 4, and 5]. In [6] a
stability indices has been discussed whose value
changes between zero (no load) and one (voltage
collapse). The indicator incorporates the effect of all
other loads in the system on the evaluation of index
at individual load buses. The overall voltage
stability of the system could be identified by the
largest value of the index evaluated amongst all the
load buses. This indicator can also be used as a
normalized quantitative measure, for estimation of
the voltage stability margin from operating point.
Another method have been proposed in conducting
the voltage stability analysis such as the P-V and Q-
V curves, modal analysis[7], artificial neural
networks [8], neuro-fuzzy networks [9], reduced
Jacobian determinant, energy function methods[10]
and sensitivity analysis [11]. Line stability indices
[12, 13] can be used to evaluate the on-line voltage
stability condition since they can be evaluated
without having to turn off the generators.
This paper presents the development of a novel
line stability index (NLSI) referred to a line which is
capable in determining the point of voltage collapse,
weak bus in the system and the most critical line in
an inter-connected system. The direction of voltage
and index profile was studied by increasing the
Proceedings of the 7th WSEAS International Conference on Power Systems, Beijing, China, September 15-17, 2007
active and reactive power until the load flow
solution fails to give any results. NLSI was
calculated for each line in the system as active and
reactive load increased. The calculated NLSI could
be used in determining the weakest bus and
criticalness.
2 DERIVATION OF VOLTAGE
STABILITY INDEX
Voltage stability and contingency analyses are two
important procedures to be conducted especially,
when voltage security assessment is discussed.
Although voltage stability can be categorized in to
two namely static and dynamic; however, static
voltage stability analysis is commonly performed on
a system and the results are indicative in
determining the voltage stability condition of a
system. In this research, static voltage stability and
contingency analyses are performed based on the
line voltage stability index termed as NVSI.
The mathematical formulation for the voltage
stability index is derived by first obtaining the
current equation through a line in a 2 bus system.
Fig.1 illustrates the two-bus power system model.
Fig. 1: two bus power system model
From the figure and taking bus 1 as the sending bus
and bus 2 as the receiving bus we have these
definitions as follows:
By choosing the sending bus as the reference
( δ 1 = 0, δ 2 = δ ), then the power equation at bus 2
is as follows;
S 2 = V2 × I * (1)
The quantity of I given by;
V1∠0 − V2 ∠δ
I=
R + jX
Where, V1 ,V2 are the voltages of the sending and
receiving buses respectively. R, X are resistance
and reactance of line respectively.
With substituting equation (2) in equation (1) we can
obtain these following equations;
V1V2 sin δ − RQ2 + XP2 = 0
165
V22 − V1V2 cos δ + RP2 + XQ2 = 0 (4)
The quadratic equation for the receiving bus is given
by;
V1 cos δ ± V12 cos 2 δ − 4( P2 R + Q2 X )
V2 = (5)
2
Where, P1 ,Q1 are the active and reactive power at
the sending buses respectively. P2 ,Q2 are the
active and reactive power at the receiving buses.
δ is angle difference between the sending and
receiving buses.
To obtain real value for V2 , the discriminate of
equation (5) must be grater than or equal to zero.
There for we can obtain this statement;
PR + QX
≤1 (6)
0.25V12 cos 2δ
Since the difference in the angle between the
sending bus and the receiving bus δ , is normally
very small, therefore,
cos δ ≈ 1
Taking the i as the sending bus and the j as the
receiving bus, the novel line stability index (NLSI)
can be expressed as,
Rij Pj + X ij Q j
NLSI ij = (7)
0.25Vi 2
Where, Rij , X ij are the resistance and reactance
between sending and receiving buses. Q j , Pj are the
reactive and active power at receiving bus. Vi is
voltage at sending bus.
Any line in the system that exhibits NLSI closed
to unity indicates that the line is approaching its
stability limit hence may lead to system violation.
Therefore, NLSI has to be maintained less than unity
in order to maintain a stable system. To comprise
the other methods with describe index that discussed
above, some index which have been used for
investigation of voltage stability by previous articles
will be describe in the next section of this paper.
(2)
3 LINE STABILITE INDEX AND
FACTOR
Mohamed, in reference [14] derive four line stability
factor termed as LQP, LPP, LPN and LQN based on
the power equation in a transmission system. LQP is
chosen for comparison since it indicates the line
voltage stability with respect to changes in reactive
(3) power. The expression for LQP is given by;
Proceedings of the 7th WSEAS International Conference on Power Systems, Beijing, China, September 15-17, 2007 166

X X 2
LQP = 4 Pi + Q j (8)
Vi 2 Vi 2
LQP must also be maintained less unity to achieve
system stability.
Also, the line stability indexes are another indexs
which indicate voltage stability of a power system.
Some of these kinds of indexes are mentioned as
follows:
Moghavvemi [12] proposed a line stability index
based on the power equation in a π model
transmission system. The index is given by;
4Qr x
Lmn = (9)
[V s sin (θ − δ )]
2
Fig. 2: voltage profile of 7 bus and NLSI index of its
lines.
Lmn has to be maintained less than unity to ensure a
stable system.
In [16] fast voltage stability index (FVSI) is
developed according to quadratic equation for a
receiving bus in a power system. The index is given
by;
4Z 2 Q j
FVSI ij = (10)
Vi 2 X
Any line in the system that exhibits FVSI closed to
unity indicates that the line is approaching its
stability limit. Therefore, FVSI has to be maintained
less than unity in order to maintain a stable system.

Fig. 3: voltage profile of 15 bus and NLSI index of its

3 Result and Discussion lines.
In order to investigate the effect of increasing
reactive power on NLSI factor and indicating the
critical line, three buses are considered. The reactive
power of bus 7, 15, 30 gradually increased from
basis quantity until the load flow equation diverged.
This is the maximum power that a bus can supply
before voltage instability happened. NLSI for each
line of system is obtained according to increase of
load. The line that has largest index is introduced as
the critical line. The voltage collapse happens if the
index exceeds one as load increases. The curves
show in Fig.2 to Fig.4 illustrate this phenomenon.
This figures show voltage of each bus according to
increase in reactive power of bus (also index of each Fig. 4: voltage profile of 30 bus and NLSI index of its
line correspond to bus). For this simulation the lines.
limitation of reactive power in each power station
has been considered. The largest value of NLSI
indicates the most critical line. For example line 18 maximum increase power for bus 7, 15 and 30
is the critical line that connects to bus 15. before voltage collapse happens, are 2.88 p.u,
Consequently, for the bus 7 it is clear that line 2 is 0.9575 p.u and 0.3397 p.u respectively. As can be
the most critical line. Also line 38 is the critical line seen, by increasing the reactive power than the cited
of bus 30. According to horizontal axes of curves values, the NLSI index exceeds one. So the power
(reactive power) it could be deduced that the system fell into the voltage collapse.
Proceedings of the 7th WSEAS International Conference on Power Systems, Beijing, China, September 15-17, 2007 167

In order to provide a comparative study the Power Delivery, vol. PWRD-1, No.3, July 1986,
stability of power system investigated with FVSI, PP. 346-354.
LQP and Lmn indexes. The results show in Table 1 [7] F D Galiana and Z C Cheng, “ Analysis of the
and compared with the NLSI index. As it can be Load Behaviour near Jacobian Singularity,”
seen NLSI has good compatibility with other IEEE Transaction on power system, Vol. 7, pp
indexes. 1529-1542, Nov 1992.
[8] A El-Keib and X Ma, “Application of Artificial
Neural Networks in Voltage Stability
Table 1: comparative study
Assessment,” IEEE Transaction on Power
Load Voltage
Line
NLSI Lmn FVSI LQP
System, Vol.10, No. 4, pp 1890-1896, Nov 1995.
No. [9] C Liu, C Chang and M Su, “Neuro-Fuzzy
Q7= 2 0.9964 0.998 1.0049 0.9842 Networks for Voltage Security Monitoring Based
V7=0.584
2.88 4 0.4574 0.5232 0.5478 0.4895 on Synchronous Pharos Measurements,” IEEE
18 0.5829 0.6246 0.6489 0.5245 Transaction on power System, Vol. 13, No. 2,
Q15= 20 0.2916 0.4594 0.5157 0.2331
V15=0.603 22 0.2617 0.3653 0.3889 0.3157
May 1998.
0.9575 [10] C DeMarco And T Overbye, “An Energy
30 0.2634 0.3468 0.3649 0.2936
Based Security Measure for Assessing
Q30= 38 0.9007 0.9262 0.9808 0.817
Vulnerability to Voltage collapse,” IEEE
V30=0.562
0.523 39 0.6544 0.698 0.7304 0.5841
Transaction on power System, Vol. 5, No. 2,pp
419-427, May 1990.
[11] N Flatabo and H Dommel, “Voltage Stability
4 Conclusion Condition in a power Transmission System
In this paper we propose a new line index for
Calculated by Sensitivity Methods,” IEEE
investigation of voltage stability in power system.
Transaction on power System, Vol.5, pp 1286-
This new index in many cases is more accurate than
1293, Nov 1990.
previous indexes that indicate voltage collapse in
[12] M Moghavemmi, and F M Omar, “Technique
power systems (because of consisting both active
for Contingency Monitoring and Voltage
and reactive power).
Collapse Prediction,” IEEE proceeding on
Generation, Transmission and Distribution, Vol.
145, No. 6, pp634-640, 1998.
References:
[13] A Mohamed, G B Jasmon and S Yusoss, “ A
[1] V Ajjarapu, C Christy, “The continuation power
Static Voltage Collapse Indicator Using Line
flow: A tool for steady state voltage stability
Stability Factor,” Journal of Industrial
analysis”, IEEE Trans. on power system. Vol. 7,
Technology, Vol. 7, No. 1.Pt C, pp 73-85, 1989.
No. 1, February 1992.
[14] Mohamed, A and Jasmon, G B, “Voltage
[2] Garng Huang, Tong Zhu, “A new method to find
Contingency Selection Technique for Security
voltage collapse point,” Proc. Of power
Assessment”, IEE Proceedings C, Vol. 136, Pt C,
Engineering Society Winter Meeting IEEE, vol.
No. 1. 1989. pp 24-28.
2, pp1324-1329, Edmonton, Canada, July 1999.
[3] Grang Huang, Tong Zhu, “Voltage security
assessments using the Arnoldi algorithm,” in
Proc. Of Power Engineering Society Winter
Meeting IEEE, vol. 2, 1999, pp635-640,
Edmonton, Canada, July 1999.
[4] Tong Zhu, Garng Huang, “Find the accurate
point of voltage collapse in real-time,” in Proc.
Of the 21st IEEE International Conference on
Power Industry Computer Application, PICA
99, Santa Clara, CA, May 1999.
[5] G Huang, H Zhang, “Dynamic Voltage Stability
reserve studies for deregulated environment”,
Proc. IEEE/PES Summer Meeting, July 2001,
Canada.
[6] P Kessel, H Glavitsch, “Estimating the voltage
stability of a power system”, IEEE Trans on